Billionaire Michael Bloomberg reportedly discussed taking his media empire public through an entity controlled by billionaire hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman.
The former mayor of New York City and presidential hopeful recently entertained an offer to sell a minority stake in Bloomberg LP — the news agency behind Bloomberg Businessweek magazine and Bloomberg TV — to Ackman’s $5 billion blank-check company, multiple sources told the New York Post.
“If the men reach a deal, Bloomberg’s stock would trade on the New York Stock Exchange in place of Ackman’s Pershing Square Tontine Holdings, a blank-check company that’s raised $5 billion to buy or merge with another company that would then take its stock listing,” the Post reported.
Sources said the former New York City mayor, who made an unsuccessful 2020 bid for the Democratic nomination, would sell a small personal stake so he can cash out without giving up control of news agency he founded in 1981, of which he owns 88 percent.
Ackman's Pershing Square Tontine Holdings Ltd. raised $4 billion in its IPO in July, making it the largest special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, IPO.
Ackman declined to comment to the Post through a spokesman.
For his part, Ackman recently touted the success of his funds, citing attractive valuations for his holdings and saying he has up to $7 billion to invest in a private company, while saying that opening stock ownership to all Americans is a key to political stability, Reuters reported.
For a second straight year, Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management is generating double-digit returns with a 44.1% gain at his Pershing Square Holdings portfolio. Four of nine portfolio companies, including Lowe's (LOW) and Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) have gained in spite of the COVID-19 outbreak.
"Our current holdings remain attractively valued, offering substantial additional profit potential over the long term," Ackman wrote to investors, adding that even those in the red, including Hilton Worldwide (HLT), "will recover in the long term."
Ackman, one of Wall Street’s best-known hedge fund managers, said his company would take a minority stake in a target company, possibly making him a more attractive investor than strategic buyers who want control.
Ackman said he is talking with potential targets and said his firm’s “idea generation engine is intact and productive.”
Investors were ready to commit as much as $12 billion to the SPAC, Tontine, Ackman wrote.
Bloomberg made news himself recently late last month when he raised over $16 million to help former felons restore their voting rights in the critical battleground state of Florida, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Bloomberg had promised to be a political force even after spending $1 billion of his own money to unsuccessfully compete with Joe Biden for the Democratic Party presidential nomination. Aides to Bloomberg said he would spend at least $100 million to help Biden's campaign against President Donald Trump in Florida.
A Bloomberg LP spokesman told the Post that the company isn’t for sale in any form and denied that a deal is being explored.
© 2026 Newsmax Finance. All rights reserved.